That is not dead which can eternal lie, and with strange aeons bring us some web forums whereupon we can gather
http://garbi.online/forum/
They rejected their own pipeline at the polls - all they have left is rail which does not have enough throughput - so unless a pipeline appears that oil will stay in the ground...a little longer.Rip wrote:Indeed it is. Not like Canada isn't going to pull that oil out and sell it. Only difference being that the path it takes now will have a larger risk and the U.S. will receive no benefit from its extraction.
Huh? How is it a minus for the environment? No matter though honestly - this is another issue that no one will remember outside the fervent.So the optics are it is a plus for the environment whereas the reality is that it is a minus. Someone in the GOP should send him a thank you card.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/artic ... ystone-xl/In the U.S., the battle over Keystone XL is primarily about climate change-driving carbon emissions produced from burning tar sands crude.
In its environmental review of the pipeline project, however, the State Department said that the Keystone XL Pipeline will not have any significant effect on how much carbon is released into the atmosphere. The market pressure for the oil industry in Canada to extract the tar sands is too great, and that crude oil will be burned and the resulting carbon will be emitted into the atmosphere regardless if Keystone is built, according to the State Department.
The State Department’s analysis says that if Keystone XL is not built, the alternatives Canada will consider, including building new pipelines and rail lines within the country, will result in up to 42 percent more CO2 being emitted than if Keystone XL goes forward.
Whoa, whoa, whoa... Keystone XL wasn't an election issue here. In fact, our shiny new PM supports (well, supported) XL, but doesn't see it as a paramount "no-brainer" deal like Harper did. He'll accept the decision and move on to other more important business.malchior wrote:They rejected their own pipeline at the polls - all they have left is rail which does not have enough throughput - so unless a pipeline appears that oil will stay in the ground...a little longer.Rip wrote:Indeed it is. Not like Canada isn't going to pull that oil out and sell it. Only difference being that the path it takes now will have a larger risk and the U.S. will receive no benefit from its extraction.
Huh? How is it a minus for the environment? No matter though honestly - this is another issue that no one will remember outside the fervent.So the optics are it is a plus for the environment whereas the reality is that it is a minus. Someone in the GOP should send him a thank you card.
Transporting the oil by rail will use energy and pose a higher risk of spills -- assuming that it is extracted regardless of transportation considerations. Enough said enough about that. One hopes that international limits on carbon emissions will take effect before the tar sands become economical to exploit.malchior wrote:They rejected their own pipeline at the polls - all they have left is rail which does not have enough throughput - so unless a pipeline appears that oil will stay in the ground...a little longer.Rip wrote:Indeed it is. Not like Canada isn't going to pull that oil out and sell it. Only difference being that the path it takes now will have a larger risk and the U.S. will receive no benefit from its extraction.
Huh? How is it a minus for the environment? No matter though honestly - this is another issue that no one will remember outside the fervent.So the optics are it is a plus for the environment whereas the reality is that it is a minus. Someone in the GOP should send him a thank you card.
That was implicit in my response. I'll still take the delays and the time that buys us to start moving on from oil. Oh and surely living where you do, you must know that there was about 0 chance that any significant bitumen dilbit was going to be refined on the Gulf Coast once it got there. Those refineries are not equipped to handle it (even the heavy sour crude refineries would need retooling and those are plenty busy with medium/heavy crude from off-shore thank you very much, heh) and the growing domestic demand is currently all about refining US tight/light shale oils from the fracking boom (with a very different set of requirements for refining).Rip wrote:Price surge also all but certain. Another matter of when. Once the Iran deal goes sideways a spike in oil prices is inevitable. Oil and Gas is a nowhere to go but up investment right now.
About six years ago, when nobody was talking about Keystone XL, I asked a Washington oil-and-gas lobbyist who was close to the Obama administration whether this pipeline was going to be a problem. "Nope," was the reply. "Just a question of going through the process." So thought we all, back then. And today, President Barack Obama finally put the fork in it. Not in America's national interest, he said.
So I called that lobbyist to ask what happened. Lobbyists can either talk boringly on the record or honestly off the record, so we went off the record. Here, more or less, was our conversation, with me helping explain a few things along the way:
"What happened was a lot of things. BP [the Deepwater Horizon oil-well rupture] happened. And for about a year, the Gulf of Mexico was on fire. And then the San Bruno fire happened [actually, a gas pipeline blew up in San Francisco with such force that bystanders said it sounded like a jet crash or an earthquake, and it scared the living daylights out of everybody and killed eight people]. And so oil and gas, which until that point was just evil, got more evil."
And then of course anti-Keystone protesters led by actress Darryl Hannah and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. started chaining themselves to the White House gates and getting arrested.
"The environmentalists got really smart. They realized this wasn't Congress approving this, this was the president, and we can affect that. So they did. Until then, some environmentalists cared about carbon, some cared about mercury, some cared about sage grouse, some cared about snail darters. But they said let's rally on Keystone. And they did. It was their focal point. They raised a lot of money."
But, I asked, didn't Congress sort of generally support it? There are all sorts of pipelines in America, after all.
"Well, Waxman-Markey died. [Meaning the American Clean Energy and Security Act, which would have limited greenhouse gases and was passionately supported by just about every important environmental group in the U.S., except for the ones that thought it was too weak.] And Obama needed something. And so Keystone just became a complete symbol to environmentalists. It was just like how NAFTA [the North American Free Trade Agreement] became a symbol of anxiety about our jobs. A cultural symbol. Keystone became one of those symbols."
But aren't people in the Midwest, where Keystone was crossing, sort of pro-business?
"Well, TransCanada Pipeline [the owner of Keystone] did it the way they have always done it, pursuing the negotiations and the land acquisitions simultaneously. That was a mistake. The eminent domain stuff in Nebraska was seen as arrogant and pissed people off."
That was a reference to the American legal doctrine of eminent domain, which basically means overriding property rights in the public interest. The Canadian pipeline company traipsed around Nebraska, a fortress of rugged individualism, forcing landowners to accept easements. As Forbes magazine put it at the time, in discussing eminent domain: "It is debatable whether building Keystone aides the health or safety of America, or even our general interest." A Nebraska court essentially agreed, thwarting TCPL, but the political damage was done.
The lobbyist continued: "And then the Republicans in Congress tried to force Obama's hand [by passing legislation allowing Keystone to go ahead] and Obama basically said the answer is maybe, but if you're gonna force my hand, the answer is no."
Obama vetoed the legislation earlier this year.
And that, in short, is the Washington insider view of what happened to Keystone. It's a pretty realistic view.
What it leaves out, of course, is the aggressive, hectoring approach of Stephen Harper's government. Harper called Keystone's approval a "no brainer," which implies that anyone with a brain, like Obama, wouldn't say no. His ministers made it a singular focus of trips to Washington. And some of their arguments, at the time, did make logical, if not political, sense. But it was annoying. One Canada-U.S. relations expert said a couple of years ago that Obama administration people "ran for cover" when Canadian ministers arrived, knowing what they'd have to put up with.
In Ottawa, American ambassador Bruce Heyman was ignored. His initial meeting with then foreign minister John Baird was ugly and uncomfortable, and Heyman simply couldn't get in to see Harper. "I do talk to the premiers," he told me at a social gathering last summer. A Canadian prime minister freezing out an American ambassador just doesn't make sense, but such was the state of relations.
Anyway, it was all local American politics in the end, despite Obama's high-handed rhetoric today about leading the way and saving the planet and keeping Canada's "dirtier oil" out of America. (If any Canadian reporter used a term like that, there'd be an immediate call from one of the oilpatch PR people — the ones who transformed the name of the "tar sands" to the "oil sands.") "As long as I'm president of the United States," Obama intoned, "America will hold ourselves to the same high standard to which we hold the rest of the world."
Oh, please. Some of my neighbours when I lived in Washington had four or five cars, and nobody really took home insulation seriously. Energy taxes there are political poison. At least Obama had the honesty to point out that Keystone's promise of American jobs and lower gas prices is less alluring in 2015 than it once was: gasoline is under $2 US a gallon in several states, and America is at five per cent unemployment. Keystone, in other words, became yesterday's bagels. Or, in Monty Python terms, a dead parrot.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's response was what you'd expect: We're disappointed, but we nonetheless vow to work closely with the United States, etc., etc. Trudeau, like Obama, clearly sees himself as a planet-saver. But really, Keystone has been blue and cold and dead for years. Like the parrot. Everyone knew it. Hillary Clinton openly intended to kill it if Obama didn't.
And what was Canada supposed to say, anyway? That it's a "no-brainer"?
How does each state rank for transparency and accountability? The State Integrity Investigation used extensive research to grade the states based on the laws and systems they have in place to deter corruption. Use the interactive to see how states scored overall and explore how they performed in each of the 13 categories.
Do you really want the grade for integrity to be adjusted to fit a normal distribution? The problem isn't the grading scale...Kraken wrote:It is a strange grading scale when the #1 state gets a grade of C.
The Jewish community of Sweden was not invited to an annual anti-Nazi event commemorating Kristallnacht due to a perceived security risk
It's a spin. The Globe story focused on MA's abysmal D+ grade, OMG!...it wasn't until I read the link in this thread that I realized MA was #10. We're in the top quintile of a bad group!Max Peck wrote:Do you really want the grade for integrity to be adjusted to fit a normal distribution? The problem isn't the grading scale...Kraken wrote:It is a strange grading scale when the #1 state gets a grade of C.
I was referring to the Northern Gateway pipeline - I recollected it wrong though. I forgot that vote was a local/non-binding vote (just looked it up to refresh my memory). Either way - there is at least a decent amount of local resistance to a pipeline there though I'm sure pressure is increasing now due to the Keystone decision.Max Peck wrote:Whoa, whoa, whoa... Keystone XL wasn't an election issue here. In fact, our shiny new PM supports (well, supported) XL, but doesn't see it as a paramount "no-brainer" deal like Harper did. He'll accept the decision and move on to other more important business.
Erika Christakis reflected on the frustrations of the students, drew on her scholarship and career experience, and composed an email inviting the community to think about the controversy through an intellectual lens that few if any had considered. Her message was a model of relevant, thoughtful, civil engagement.
For her trouble, a faction of students are now trying to get the couple removed from their residential positions, which is to say, censured and ousted from their home on campus. Hundreds of Yale students are attacking them, some with hateful insults, shouted epithets, and a campaign of public shaming. In doing so, they have shown an illiberal streak that flows from flaws in their well-intentioned ideology.
Those who purport to speak for marginalized students at elite colleges sometimes expose serious shortcomings in the way that their black, brown, or Asian classmates are treated, and would expose flaws in the way that religious students and ideological conservatives are treated too if they cared to speak up for those groups. I’ve known many Californians who found it hard to adjust to life in the Ivy League, where a faction of highly privileged kids acculturated at elite prep schools still set the tone of a decidedly East Coast culture. All else being equal, outsiders who also feel like racial or ethnic “others” typically walk the roughest road of all.
This seems to be a pet topic of sorts with The Atlantic . I largely agree with their POV on the matter, but for a center-left publication to be taking such a hard stand on this specific issue is pretty interesting. (I believe that Reason - certainly NOT a center-left publication - has also made some arguments along the same lines which I have appreciated for their rationality and lack of reactionary language.) That said, hopefully seeing this criticism coming from nominally within will give some of the more moderate voices a bit of courage.Moliere wrote:The New Intolerance of Student Activism
Erika Christakis reflected on the frustrations of the students, drew on her scholarship and career experience, and composed an email inviting the community to think about the controversy through an intellectual lens that few if any had considered. Her message was a model of relevant, thoughtful, civil engagement.
For her trouble, a faction of students are now trying to get the couple removed from their residential positions, which is to say, censured and ousted from their home on campus. Hundreds of Yale students are attacking them, some with hateful insults, shouted epithets, and a campaign of public shaming. In doing so, they have shown an illiberal streak that flows from flaws in their well-intentioned ideology.
Those who purport to speak for marginalized students at elite colleges sometimes expose serious shortcomings in the way that their black, brown, or Asian classmates are treated, and would expose flaws in the way that religious students and ideological conservatives are treated too if they cared to speak up for those groups. I’ve known many Californians who found it hard to adjust to life in the Ivy League, where a faction of highly privileged kids acculturated at elite prep schools still set the tone of a decidedly East Coast culture. All else being equal, outsiders who also feel like racial or ethnic “others” typically walk the roughest road of all.
The culturally unaware or insensitive choices made by some members of our community in the past, have not just been directed toward a cultural group, but have impacted religious beliefs, Native American/Indigenous people, Socio-economic strata, Asians, Hispanic/Latino, Women, Muslims, etc. In many cases the student wearing the costume has not intended to offend, but their actions or lack of forethought have sent a far greater message than any apology could after the fact…
There is growing national concern on campuses everywhere about these issues, and we encourage Yale students to take the time to consider their costumes and the impact it may have. So, if you are planning to dress-up for Halloween, or will be attending any social gatherings planned for the weekend, please ask yourself these questions before deciding upon your costume choice:
• Wearing a funny costume? Is the humor based on “making fun” of real people, human traits or cultures?
• Wearing a historical costume? If this costume is meant to be historical, does it further misinformation or historical and cultural inaccuracies?
• Wearing a ‘cultural’ costume? Does this costume reduce cultural differences to jokes or stereotypes?
• Wearing a ‘religious’ costume? Does this costume mock or belittle someone’s deeply held faith tradition?
• Could someone take offense with your costume and why?
Here is a great resource for costume ideas organized by our own Community & Consent Educators (CCEs)
You mean like a perceived war on Christmas?Rip wrote:Nice to see that even though people say they are convinced that guns and shooting are at epidemic proportions they prove they don't believe that by spending time and effort such important issues as making the world more PC.
Seems all is rosy with the world if people have such time and energy to waste.
It's cringe inducing for me but not terribly offensive. Typically those costumes will get what they deserve, derision and party murmurs.AWS260 wrote: As a side note, I wish that someone had said that to the parents of my son's schoolmates. At his elementary school's Halloween bash, I saw one grown-ass white lady dressed as an "Indian princess," and another one wearing a freaking "Chinaman" costume. It was horrifying.
This is the part I consider tragic. We should have a movie night at my place for the gaming gang some night.LawBeefaroni wrote: he's so-and-so from Big Lebowski..." (the John Goodman character). I haven't seen it
Agreed. Nothing is sadder than making a The Big Lebowski reference, then -- after having to explain it -- getting a "The Big Who-now?" response.hepcat wrote:This is the part I consider tragic.LawBeefaroni wrote: he's so-and-so from Big Lebowski..." (the John Goodman character). I haven't seen it
So why'd you get pissed off that he was calling you a "beaner?"LawBeefaroni wrote:It's cringe inducing for me but not terribly offensive. Typically those costumes will get what they deserve, derision and party murmurs.AWS260 wrote: As a side note, I wish that someone had said that to the parents of my son's schoolmates. At his elementary school's Halloween bash, I saw one grown-ass white lady dressed as an "Indian princess," and another one wearing a freaking "Chinaman" costume. It was horrifying.
The kiddo wanted to be a kokeshi (traditional Japanese doll). I hated that I had to think about it for a second and hated even more that I thought, "Well, she's a quarter Japanese so it should be OK." The whole cultural appropriation danger thing is out of control.
What bothers me is people who think that because they're in costume, anything goes. One year one guy at the bar kept calling me a "beaner." Eventually I had enough and went to put him through the front window and about 8 of his friends jumped up and said, "lighten up, he's so-and-so from Big Lebowski..." (the John Goodman character). I haven't seen it so I believed this paper thin excuse but I asked why he wasn't calling them "beaners" and they didn't have an answer. I went after him when he said it again while they were all scratching their heads trying to figure it out. Unfortunately it got broken up before I could put him through the window.
Imagine a bad drunk keep shouting something at you. Now imagine that that he's shouting "nigger" or "beaner." It's a derogatory term intended as an insult (at the very least). That's why.geezer wrote: So why'd you get pissed off that he was calling you a "beaner?"
Yeah, I almost didn't put that in there. I have friends who, whenever I see them, the first thing they ask is if I've watched it yet.Max Peck wrote:Agreed. Nothing is sadder than making a The Big Lebowski reference, then -- after having to explain it -- getting a "The Big Who-now?" response.hepcat wrote:This is the part I consider tragic.LawBeefaroni wrote: he's so-and-so from Big Lebowski..." (the John Goodman character). I haven't seen it
Right - of course. So the reason I ask is, (and understand that I'm pointing this out as someone who 100% agrees that the reaction to the Yale email is preposterous), the contention is that seeing a bunch of people in indian princess costumes, or "chinaman" costumes is equivalent to shouting slurs at you, made worse by the fact that society as a whole thinks that you should just chill out and take it.LawBeefaroni wrote:Imagine a bad drunk keep shouting something at you. Now imagine that that he's shouting "nigger" or "beaner." It's a derogatory term intended as an insult (at the very least). That's why.geezer wrote: So why'd you get pissed off that he was calling you a "beaner?"
Why did he call me a "beaner?" He thought I looked Mexican. He made that clear when he was getting tossed out of the place.
I don't think she was disagreeing with the sentiment about keeping costumes un-insulting. She was disagreeing with the way they said it. AWS's short version is better. And it's more in line with something you tell adults.geezer wrote: So in a sense, while I certainly think that gathering pitchforks because an administrator waxed philosophical on what it means to have freedom of expression is insanity, I can comprehend the perspective that seeing a bunch of rich white kids playing dress up with your ethnicity for a laugh can be tantamount to throwing slurs at you. That's all I'm saying.
AWS260 wrote:Word of advice: Don't be the asshole who wears a racist costume on Halloween. You know who you are.
I once sat at a bar after closing shouting "Barton Fink!" in various intonations and emphasises at a gentleman that only in the loosest terms could be said to resemble said character.LawBeefaroni wrote:Imagine a bad drunk keep shouting something at you. Now imagine that that he's shouting "nigger" or "beaner."geezer wrote: So why'd you get pissed off that he was calling you a "beaner?"
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/201 ... s-license/Some states ban smiling in driver’s license photos, but wearing a colander on one’s head is apparently allowed.
A Massachusetts woman this week won the right to wear a colander on her head in her driver’s license photo after citing religious reasons. Lindsay Miller identifies as a “Pastafarian” and member of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, which some critics call a parody religion.
Oh, and his booking video can't be released:Isgrimnur wrote:Texas Atty Gen indicted:
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has been indicted on three charges by a grand jury in Collin County, two people close to the case told NBC 5 on Saturday.
...
The grand jury and two special prosecutors have been investigating whether Paxton committed a securities crime by acting as a broker without being licensed.
Paxton admitted he was not registered and paid a $1,000 civil fine last year. He has said he thought that the fine ended the matter.
The video of Attorney General Ken Paxton's post-indictment booking should not be released, his office has decided, because it would jeopardize the security of the Collin County Jail.
"We find the release of the submitted information would interfere with law enforcement," Assistant Attorney General Kenny Moreland wrote to Robert J. Davis, counsel for Collin County, on October 21. "Accordingly, the sheriffs office may withhold the submitted information."
...
Collin County asked the attorney general's office to block the video's release, saying it showed "secured areas of the facility" and revealed "'blind spots' and where, when, and why security cameras move in the facility."
...
Based on these concerns, the office said the sheriff could refuse to release the video. Paxton was not involved in making the decision, his staff said, because it would be an obvious conflict of interest.
The company he was shilling was called Servergy, who supposedly made energy efficient servers. Among their many claims was that they had a big order from Amazon. That huge deal? One guy who worked at Amazon was promised a free server for his personal use.Isgrimnur wrote:Oh, and his booking video can't be released:Isgrimnur wrote:Texas Atty Gen indicted:
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has been indicted on three charges by a grand jury in Collin County, two people close to the case told NBC 5 on Saturday.
...
The grand jury and two special prosecutors have been investigating whether Paxton committed a securities crime by acting as a broker without being licensed.
Paxton admitted he was not registered and paid a $1,000 civil fine last year. He has said he thought that the fine ended the matter.
The video of Attorney General Ken Paxton's post-indictment booking should not be released, his office has decided, because it would jeopardize the security of the Collin County Jail.
"We find the release of the submitted information would interfere with law enforcement," Assistant Attorney General Kenny Moreland wrote to Robert J. Davis, counsel for Collin County, on October 21. "Accordingly, the sheriffs office may withhold the submitted information."
...
Collin County asked the attorney general's office to block the video's release, saying it showed "secured areas of the facility" and revealed "'blind spots' and where, when, and why security cameras move in the facility."
...
Based on these concerns, the office said the sheriff could refuse to release the video. Paxton was not involved in making the decision, his staff said, because it would be an obvious conflict of interest.
McKINNEY — In late 2012, Steven Noonan stumbled onto the website of a company named Servergy.
A computer hobbyist in Seattle whose day job was designing software for online retailer Amazon, he was intrigued by the description of an ultra-efficient computer server. He emailed the company to inquire about specs.
A Servergy vice president wrote back, asking about Amazon’s data centers and whether they could set up a call. Noonan warned he wasn’t inquiring on behalf of Amazon — he just liked messing around with electronics.
But the company persisted, offering to send him a server to test free of charge, and Noonan accepted, he told The Dallas Morning News.
...
In early 2013, [Servergy founder and chairman] Mapp emailed investors touting a deal with Amazon. He emailed one investment adviser: “Many BIG exciting updates, including: We just got our first big order from Amazon ...”
You should have. I would have. You still can. Make sure you look like you're reading it and nodding thoughtfully.Rip wrote:I thought of you guys and grinned as I entered the kitchen at the office and glanced across at the table against the wall. There nestled against the cracker basket standing on end to be prominently displayed was a copy of One Nation by Ben Carson. It was all I could do to resist snapping a selfie with it.
